Testimony from Soularium

My name is Walter Brigman and today I'd like to share with you my confession of faith.
To begin, you need to know about my life before accepting Christ. I grew up in the small town of Chesterfield, SC. Chesterfield is a small town where everyone knows each other and is filled with traditional southern Baptist churches. When I was growing up, my dad worked all week (and still does) to provide for our family. Mom usually had Sundays off, so my brother and I would be woken up and dragged off to church. My parents are both believers and tried their best to instill in me Christian values. I say Christian values because they knew it would take an act of the Holy Spirit for me to become a Christian. I continued to grow up in this small town and had a relatively normal life. I grew up playing sports because that’s all we had to do. They eventually became my passion and I grew to focus on baseball and football. I entered high school playing these two sports and really didn't think much about the “church thing“ My friends and I were having fun and enjoying teenage life. Occasionally, we would go to an FCA meeting or a high school ministry at a local church but it never really meant anything to us. There were even times we talked about becoming Christians but we felt it was just a collection of rules that didn't have any meaning to us. We'd always say, “Maybe when we're older, we'll become Christians”, never realizing that we may not have tomorrow.
High school continued and senior year quickly came. Our football season started and I was having a good year. A few colleges were asking about me and I was enjoying this time. In our first playoff game that year, I broke my left ankle in the first quarter. This injury, combined with the previous ones I had, left the few colleges interested in me closing off contact. Now, I see these injuries as blessings but at the time, they were the end of my young life. All my life, I had played football and baseball, and then I was facing the option of never playing either again. Senior year ended soon enough and I came to Charleston Southern with the small hope of playing football or baseball here. That hope was quickly taken away and I was left with a void in my life. I had started partying my senior year and that continued into college. I used that to fill the hole in my life. I wasn't completely out of control but my focus certainly wasn't on school. I finished the semester barely passing my classes and went back home. Back at home, to my parents' dismay; I continued the awful lifestyle I was living. Christmas break came and went and soon enough I was back at school. Second semester seemed to be going about the same as the first. I was doing much better in classes but still continued the partying. One day, I was going to work and stopped by the Strom Thurmond center to check my mail. A friend of mine was conducting a solarium survey and asked me to take it. The questions ranged from “Which image would you use to describe God” to “When you think about your own spiritual life or journey, which image best represents what you wish were true?” I really struggled with these questions. I finished the survey and didn't rally know what to think. I walked away confused and felling like I needed to talk to my friend more about God but I didn't. I went to work that afternoon and didn't really think anymore about the survey. I then left Charleston for the weekend to see some friends in the upstate. I tried to enjoy my visit but God just wasn't going to let me do that. I tried to continue with my normal lifestyle that weekend by partying with my friends but it just wasn't in me to do it anymore. I came back that Sunday and called my friend who had given me the survey. He met me in my room and we talked about the questions I had from the survey. As we went through those, I began to realize that something was missing in my life that couldn't be filled with anything I did. God had been laying convictions on my heart and it culminated with my friend reading Revelation 3:20. He asked me if I wanted to accept Christ as my Lord and Savior and we prayed together about it. Later that night, I called my parents and gave them probably the best news they've ever heard from me.
Afterwards, my friend began to disciple me and help through my first few weeks as a Christian. I'd like to say that it was a walk in the park but that wasn't the case. I had to make a drastic change in the lifestyle I'd been living for over a year and a half. I had to say goodbye to some friends whom I really didn't need to be friends with. I'd love to say this change to place overnight but it took a while for me to get right with God in all areas of my life. This was definitely a tough time of my life. I know it's funny for me to say that right after accepting Christ was a tough time in my life but I had to change my entire life after that moment. I wasn't a bad person but my life definitely didn't match up with what God wanted for me. I also had many questions and few answers though this time. I was overwhelmed with the things my friends and family were sharing with me and it was confusing. However, with their continued support and love, I moved through this time probably as painlessly as possible.
I accepted Christ almost three years ago. It's been a difficult walk but it's been worth every step I've taken with the Lord. That void I had in my life is gone and has been replaced by Jesus. The things I worried about before are things that I don't think about now. Jesus Christ has transformed my life. I know that day I walked by my friend doing the solarium survey was God moving in my life. He had been working on my heart and was just waiting to finish the job. I thank God everyday for my friend evangelizing as he was commanded to and for God himself caring enough about me to send His son to die on the cross for my sins.